Black bear scales 10-foot fence to visit Knoxville Zoo

Five-year-old Madison Jones of Maryville observes a new 11-month-old black bear cub at the Knoxville Zoo's Black Bear Falls exhibit in December. The 115-pound bear came from the Wildlife Center of Virginia, after being found by animal control officers in Waynesboro, Va., traveling with a group of dogs and wearing a dog collar. A black bear apparently broke into the zoo late at night on Monday, June 24, 2013. (Photo by Amy Smotherman Burgess)

While zoos are always alert to keep their exotic animals safely inside their habitats, they rarely experience a wild animal the size of a bear wanting to get inside their boundaries.

It was about midnight when a zoo ranger spotted a young black bear scaling the 10-foot-high chain-link and barbed wire of the zoo's perimeter fence. A neighbor had alerted the zoo a bear had been seen in the Chilhowee Park area, zoo spokeswoman Tina Rolen said today.

A zoo ranger headed to the park area near its herpetology building and close to Chilhowee Park's East Tennessee Discovery Center. The ranger saw the bear — described as a youngster weighing maybe 150 pounds — in Chilhowee Park.

That's when the bear scaled the fence into the zoo.

The ranger quickly called other zoo rangers and staff members, Rolen said.

The first thought was to check the zoo's own group of four captive black bears which lounge in the natural habitat Black Bear Falls in another section of the park. Zookeepers quickly counted bear noses and discovered that none of their bears were out and about for an evening stroll.